Ek-powa Ghat—Sandstones—Shahgunj—Table-land, elevation,
etc.—Gum-arabic—Mango—Fair—Aquatic plants—Rujubbund—Storm—False sunset
and sunrise—Bind hills—Mirzapore—Manufactures, imports, etc.—Climate
of—Thuggee—Chunar—Benares—Mosque—Observatory—Sar-nath—Ghazeepore—Rose-
gardens—Manufactory of Attar—Lord Cornwallis’ tomb—Ganges, scenery and
natural history of—Pelicans—Vegetation—Insects—Dinapore—Patna—Opium
godowns and manufacture—Mudar, white and purple—Monghyr islets—Hot
Springs of Setakoond—Alluvium of Ganges—Rocks of
Sultun-gunj—Bhaugulpore—Temples of Mt. Manden—Coles and native
tribes—Bhaugulpore rangers—Horticultural gardens.
On the 3rd of March I bade farewell to Mr. Williams and his kind party,
and rode over a plain to the village of Markunda, at the foot of the
Ghat. There the country becomes very rocky and wooded, and a stream is
crossed, which runs over a flat bed of limestone, cracked into the
appearance of a tesselated pavement. For many miles there is no pass
over the Kymore range, except this, significantly called “Ek-powa-Ghat”
(one-foot Ghat). It is evidently a _fault,_ or shifting of the rocks,
producing so broken a cliff as to admit of a path winding over the
shattered crags. On either side, the precipices are extremely steep, of
horizontally stratified rocks, continued in an unbroken line, and the
views across the plain and Soane valley, over which the sun was now
setting, were superb. At the summit we entered on a dead flat plain or
table-land, with no hills, except along the brim of the broad valley we
had left, where are some curious broad pyramids, formed of slabs of
sandstone arranged in steps. By dark we reached the village of Roump
(alt. 1,090 feet), beyond the top of the pass.
On the next day I proceeded on a small, fast, and wofully high-trotting
elephant, to Shahgunj, where I enjoyed Mr. Felle’s hospitality for a
few days. The country here, though elevated, is, from the nature of the
soil and formation, much more fertile than what I had left. Water is
abundant, both in tanks and wells, and rice-fields, broad and
productive, cover the ground; while groves of tamarinds and mangos, now
loaded with blossoms, occur at every village.
It is very singular that the elevation of this table-land (1,100 feet
at Shahgunj) should coincide with that of the granite range of Upper
Bengal, where crossed by the grand trunk road, though they have no
feature but the presence of alluvium in common. Scarce a hillock varies
the surface here, and the agricultural produce of the two is widely
different. Here the flat ledges of sandstone retain the moisture, and
give rise to none of those impetuous torrents which sweep it off the
inclined beds of gneiss, or splintered quartz. Nor is there here any of
the effloresced salts so forbidding to vegetation where they occur.
Wherever the alluvium is deep on these hills, neither _Catechu,
Olibanum, Butea, Terminalia, Diospyros,_ dwarf-palm, or any of those
plants are to be met with, which abound wherever the rock is
superficial, and irrespectively of its mineral characters.
The gum-arabic _Acacia_ is abundant here, though not seen below, and
very rare to the eastward of this meridian, for I saw but little of it
in Behar. It is a plant partial to a dry climate, and rather prefers a
good soil. In its distribution it in some degree follows the range of
the camel, which is its constant companion over thousands of leagues.
In the valley of the Ganges I was told that neither the animal nor
plant flourish east of the Soane, where I experienced a marked change
in the humidity of the atmosphere on my passage down the Ganges. It was
a circumstance I was interested in, having first met with the camel at
Teneriffe and the Cape Verd Islands, the westernmost limit of its
distribution; imported thither, however, as it now is into Australia,
where, though there is no _Acacia Arabica,_ four hundred other species
of the genus are known.
The mango, which is certainly _the_ fruit of India, (as the pine-apple
is of the Eastern Islands, and the orange of the West,) was now
blossoming, and a superb sight. The young leaves are purplish-green,
and form a curious contrast to the deep lurid hue of the older foliage;
especially when the tree is (which often occurs) dimidiate, one half
the green, and the other the red shades of colours; when in full
blossom, all forms a mass of yellow, diffusing a fragrance rather too
strong and peculiar to be pleasant.
We passed a village where a large fair was being held, and singularly
familiar its arrangements were to my early associations. The women and
children are the prime customers; for the latter whirl-you-go-rounds,
toys, and sweetmeats were destined; to tempt the former, little booths
of gay ornaments, patches for the forehead, ear-rings of quaint shapes,
bugles and beads. Here as at home, I remarked that the vendors of these
superfluities occupy the approaches to this Vanity-Fair. As, throughout
the East, the trades are congregated into particular quarters of the
cities, so here the itinerants grouped themselves into little bazaars
for each class of commodity. Whilst I was engaged in purchasing a few
articles of native workmanship, my elephant made an attack on a
sweetmeat stall, demolishing a magnificent erection of barley-sugar,
before his proceedings could be put a stop to.
Mr. Felle’s bungalow (whose garden smiled with roses in this
wilderness) was surrounded by a moat (fed by a spring), which was full
of aquatic plants, _Nymphæa, Damasonium, Villarsia cristata,
Aponogeton,_ three species of _Potamogeton,_ two of _Naias, Chara_ and
_Zannichellia_ (the two latter indifferently, and often together, used
in the refinement of sugar). In a large tank hard by, wholly fed by
rain water, I observed only the _Villarsia Indica,_ no _Aponogeton,
Nymphæa,_ or _Dammonium,_ nor did these occur in any of the other tanks
I examined, which were otherwise well peopled with plants. This may not
be owing to the quality of the water so much as to its varying quantity
in the tank.
All around here, as at Roump, is a dead flat, except towards the crest
of the ghats which overhang the valley of the Soane, and there the
sandstone rock rises by steps into low hills. During a ride to a
natural tank amongst these rocky elevations, I passed from the alluvium
to the sandstone, and at once met with all the prevailing plants of the
granite, gneiss, limestone and hornstone rocks previously examined, and
which I have enumerated too often to require recapitulation; a
convincing proof that the mechanical properties and not the chemical
constitution of the rocks regulate the distribution of these plants.
Rujubbund (the pleasant spot), is a small tarn, or more properly the
expanded bed of a stream, art having aided nature in its formation: it
is edged by rocks and cliffs fringed with the usual trees of the
neighbourhood; it is a wild and pretty spot, not unlike some
birch-bordered pool in the mountains of Wales or Scotland, sequestered
and picturesque. It was dark before I got back, with heavy clouds and
vivid lightning approaching from the south-west. The day had been very
hot (3 p.m., 90°), and the evening the same; but the barometer did not
foretell the coming tempest, which broke with fury at 7 p.m., blowing
open the doors, and accompanied with vivid lightning and heavy thunder,
close by and all round, though no rain fell.
In the clear dry mornings of these regions, a curious optical phenomena
may be observed, of a _sunrise_ in the _west,_ and _sunset_ in the
_east._ In either case, bright and well-defined beams rise to the
zenith, often crossing to the opposite horizon. It is a beautiful
feature in the firmament, and equally visible whether the horizon be
cloudy or clear, the white beams being projected indifferently against
a dark vapour or the blue serene. The zodiacal light shines from an
hour or two after sunset till midnight, with singular brightness,
almost equalling the milky way.
_March 7._—Left Shahgunj for Mirzapore, following the road to Goorawal,
over a dead alluvial flat without a feature to remark. Turning north
from that village, the country undulates, exposing the rocky nucleus,
and presenting the usual concomitant vegetation. Occasionally park-like
views occurred, which, where diversified by the rocky valleys, resemble
much the noble scenery of the Forest of Dean on the borders of Wales;
the _Mahowa_ especially representing the oak, with its spreading and
often gnarled branches. Many of the exposed slabs of sandstone are
beautifully waved on the surface with the _ripple-mark_ impression.
Amowee, where I arrived at 9 p.m., is on an open grassy flat, about
fifteen miles from the Ganges, which is seen from the neighbourhood,
flowing among trees, with the white houses, domes, and temples of
Mirzapore scattered around, and high above which the dust-clouds were
coursing along the horizon.
Mr. Money, the magistrate of Mirzapore, kindly sent a mounted messenger
to meet me here, who had vast trouble in getting bearers for my palkee.
In it I proceeded the next day to Mirzapore, descending a steep ghat of
the Bind hills by an excellent road, to the level plains of the Ganges.
Unlike the Dunwah pass, this is wholly barren. At the foot the sun was
intensely hot, the roads alternately rocky and dusty, the villages
thronged with a widely different looking race from those of the hills,
and the whole air of the outskirts, on a sultry afternoon, far from
agreeable.
Mirzapore is a straggling town, said to contain 100,000 inhabitants. It
flanks the river, and is built on an undulating alluvial bank, full of
kunker, elevated 360 feet above the sea, and from 50 to 80 above the
present level of the river. The vicinity of the Ganges and its green
bank, and the numbers of fine trees around, render it a pleasing,
though not a fine town. It presents the usual Asiatic contrast of
squalor and gaudiness; consisting of large squares and broad streets,
interspersed with acres of low huts and groves of trees. It is
celebrated for its manufactory of carpets, which are admirable in
appearance, and, save in durability, equal to the English. Indigo seed
from Bundelkund is also a most extensive article of commerce, the best
coming from the Doab. For cotton, lac, sugar, and saltpetre, it is one
of the greatest marts in India. The articles of native manufacture are
brass washing and cooking utensils, and stone deities worked out of the
sandstone.
There is little native vegetation, the country being covered with
cultivation and extensive groves of mango, and occasionally of guava.
English vegetables are abundant and excellent, and the strawberries,
which ripen in March, rival the European fruit in size, but hardly in
flavour.
During the few days spent at Mirzapore with my kind friend, Mr. C.
Hamilton, I was surprised to find the temperature of the day cooler by
nearly 4° than that of the hills above, or of the upper part of the
Soane valley; while on the other hand the nights were decidedly warmer.
The dewpoint again was even lower in proportion, (7·5°) and the climate
consequently drier. The atmosphere was extremely dry and electrical,
the hair constantly crackling when combed. Further west, where the
climate becomes still drier, the electricity of the air is even
greater. Mr. Griffith mentions in his journal that in filling barometer
tubes in Affghanistan, he constantly experienced a shock.
Here I had the pleasure of meeting Lieutenant Ward, one of the
suppressors of Thuggee (_Thuggee,_ in Hindostan, signifies a deceiver;
fraud, not open force, being employed). This gentleman kindly showed me
the approvers or king’s evidence of his establishment, belonging to
those three classes of human scourges, the Thug, Dakoit, and Poisoner.
Of these the first was the Thug, a mild-looking man, who had been born
and bred to the profession: he had committed many murders, saw no harm
in them, and felt neither shame nor remorse. His organs of observation
and destructiveness were large, and the cerebellum small. He explained
to me how the gang waylay the unwary traveller, enter into conversation
with him, and have him suddenly seized, when the superior throws his
own linen girdle round the victim’s neck and strangles him, pressing
the knuckles against the spine. Taking off his own, he passed it round
my arm, and showed me the turn as coolly as a sailor once taught me the
_hangman’s knot._ The Thug is of any caste, and from any part of India.
The profession have particular stations, which they generally select
for murder, throwing the body of their victim into a well.
The Dakoit (_dakhee,_ a robber) belongs to a class who rob in gangs,
but never commit murder—arson and housebreaking also forming part of
their profession. These are all high-class Rajpoots, originally from
Guzerat; who, on being conquered, vowed vengeance on mankind. They
speak both Hindostanee and the otherwise extinct Guzerat language; this
is guttural in the extreme, and very singular in sound. They are a very
remarkable people, found throughout India, and called by various names;
their women dress peculiarly, and are utterly devoid of modesty. The
man I examined was a short, square, but far from powerful Nepalese,
with high arched eyebrows, and no organs of observation. These people
are great cowards.
The Poisoners all belong to one caste, of Pasie, or dealers in toddy:
they go singly or in gangs, haunting the travellers’ resting-places,
where they drop half a rupee weight of pounded or whole _Datura_ seeds
into his food, producing a twenty-hours’ intoxication, during which he
is robbed, and left to recover or sink under the stupifying effects of
the narcotic. He told me that the _Datura_ seed is gathered without
ceremony, and at any time, place, or age of the plant. He was a dirty,
ill-conditioned looking fellow, with no bumps behind his ears, or
prominence of eyebrow region, but a remarkable cerebellum.
Though now all but extinct (except in Cuttack), through ten or fifteen
years of unceasing vigilance on the part of Government, and incredible
activity and acuteness in the officers employed, the Thugs were
formerly a wonderfully numerous body, who abstained from their vocation
solely in the immediate neighbourhood of their own villages; which,
however, were not exempt from the visits of other Thugs; so that, as
Major Sleeman says,—“The annually returning tide of murder swept
unsparingly over the whole face of India, from the Sutlej to the
sea-coast, and from the Himalaya to Cape Comorin. One narrow district
alone was free, the Concan, beyond the ghats, whither they never
penetrated.” In Bengal, river Thugs replace the travelling
practitioner. Candeish and Rohilkund alone harboured no Thugs as
residents, but they were nevertheless haunted by the gangs.
Their origin is uncertain, but supposed to be very ancient, soon after
the Mahommedan conquest. They now claim a divine original, and are
supposed to have supernatural powers, and to be the emissaries of the
divinity, like the wolf, the tiger, and the bear. It is only lately
that they have swarmed so prodigiously,—seven original gangs having
migrated from Delhi to the Gangetic provinces about 200 years ago, and
from these all the rest have sprung. Many belong to the most amiable,
intelligent, and respectable classes of the lower and even middle
ranks: they love their profession, regard murder as sport, and are
never haunted with dreams, or troubled with pangs of conscience during
hours of solitude, or in the last moments of life. The victim is an
acceptable sacrifice to the goddess Davee, who by some classes is
supposed to eat the lifeless body, and thus save her votaries the
necessity of concealing it.
They are extremely superstitious, always consulting omens, such as the
direction in which a hare or jackall crosses the road; and even far
more trivial circumstances will determine the fate of a dozen of
people, and perhaps of an immense treasure. All worship the pickaxe,
which is symbolical of their profession, and an oath sworn on it binds
closer than on the Koran. The consecration of this weapon is a most
elaborate ceremony, and takes place only under certain trees. They rise
through various grades: the lowest are scouts; the second, sextons; the
third are holders of the victims’ hands; the highest, stranglers.
Though all agree in never practising cruelty, or robbing previous to
murder,—never allowing any but infants to escape (and these are trained
to Thuggee), and never leaving a trace of such goods as may be
identified,—there are several variations in their mode of conducting
operations; some tribes spare certain castes, others none: murder of
woman is against all rules; but the practice crept into certain gangs,
and this it is which led to their discountenance by the goddess Davee,
and the consequent downfall of the system. Davee, they say, allowed the
British to punish them, because a certain gang had murdered the mothers
to obtain their daughters to be sold to prostitution.
Major Sleeman has constructed a map demonstrating the number of
“Bails,” or regular stations for committing murder, in the kingdom of
Oude alone, which is 170 miles long by 100 broad, and in which are 274,
which are regarded by the Thug with as much satisfaction and interest
as a game preserve is in England: nor are these “bails” less numerous
in other parts of India. Of twenty assassins who were examined, one
frankly confessed to having been engaged in 931 murders, and the least
guilty of the number to 24. Sometimes 150 persons collected into one
gang, and their profits have often been immense, the murder of six
persons on one occasion yielding 82,000 rupees; upwards of 8000 pounds.
Of the various facilities for keeping up the system, the most prominent
are, the practice amongst the natives of travelling before dawn, of
travellers mixing freely together, and taking their meals by the
way-side instead of in villages; in the very Bails, in fact, to which
they are inveigled by the Thug in the shape of a fellow-traveller;
money remittances are also usually made by disguised travellers, whose
treasure is exposed at the custom-houses, and, worst of all, the
bankers will never own to the losses they sustain, which, as a
visitation of God, would, if avenged, lead, they think, to future, and
perhaps heavier punishment. Had the Thugs destroyed Englishmen, they
would quickly have been put down; but the system being invariably
practised on a class of people acknowledging the finger of the Deity in
its execution, its glaring enormities were long in rousing the
attention of the Indian Government.
A few examples of the activity exercised by the suppressors may be
interesting. They act wholly through the information given by
approvers, who are simply king’s evidences. Of 600 Thugs engaged in the
murder of 64 people, and the plunder of nearly 20,000 pounds, all
except seventy were captured in ten years, though separated into six
gangs, and their operations continued from 1,826 to 1830: the last
party was taken in 1836. And again, between the years 1826 and 1835,
1,562 Thugs were seized, of whom 382 were hanged, and 909 transported;
so that now it is but seldom these wretches are ever heard of.
To show the extent of their operations I shall quote an anecdote from
Sleeman’s Reports (to which I am indebted for most of the above
information). He states that he was for three years in charge of a
district on the Nerbudda, and considered himself acquainted with every
circumstance that occurred in the neighbourhood; yet, during that time,
100 people were murdered and buried within less than a quarter of a
mile of his own residence!
Two hundred and fifty boats full of river Thugs, in crews of fifteen,
infested the Ganges between Benares and Calcutta, during five months of
every year, under pretence of conveying pilgrims. Travellers along the
banks were tracked, and offered a passage, which if refused in the
first boat was probably accepted in some other. At a given signal the
crews rushed in, doubled up the decoyed victim, broke his back, and
threw him into the river, where floating corpses are too numerous to
elicit even an exclamation.
At Mirzapore I engaged a boat to carry me down the river to Bhagulpore,
whence I was to proceed to the Sikkim-Himalaya. The sketch at p.88 will
give some idea of this vessel, which, though slow and very shabby, had
the advantage of being cooler and more commodious than the handsomer
craft. Its appearance was not unlike that of a floating haystack, or
thatched cottage: its length was forty feet, and breadth fifteen, and
it drew a foot and a half of water: the deck, on which a kind of house,
neatly framed of matting, was erected, was but a little above the
water’s edge. My portion of this floating residence was lined with a
kind of reed-work formed of long culms of _Saccharum._ The crew and
captain consisted of six naked Hindoos, one of whom steered by the huge
rudder, sitting on a bamboo-stage astern; the others pulled four oars
in the very bows opposite my door, or tracked the boat along the
riverbank.
In my room (for cabin I cannot call it) stood my palkee, fitted as a
bed, with mosquito curtains; a chair and table. On one side were placed
all my papers and plants, under arrangement to go home; on the other,
my provisions, rice, sugar, curry-powder, a preserved ham, and cheese,
etc. Around hung telescope, botanical box, dark lantern, barometer, and
thermometer, etc., etc. Our position was often _ashore,_ and,
Hindoo-like, on the lee-shore, going bump, bump, bump, so that I could
hardly write. I considered myself fortunate in having to take this slow
conveyance down, it enabling me to write and arrange all day long.
I left on the 15th of March, and in the afternoon of the same day
passed Chunar.[23] This is a tabular mass of sandstone, projecting into
the river, and the eastern termination of the Kymore range. There is
not a rock between this and the Himalaya, and barely a stone all the
way down the Ganges, till the granite and gneiss rocks of the Behar
range are again met with. The current of the Ganges is here very
strong, and its breadth much lessened: the river runs between high
banks of alluvium, containing much kunker. At Benares it expands into a
broad stream, with a current which during the rains is said to flow
eight miles an hour, when the waters rise 43 feet. The fall hence is
300 feet to its junction with the Hooghly, viz., one foot to every
mile. My observations made that from Mirzapore to Benares considerably
greater.
[23] The first station at which Henry Martyn laboured in India.
Benares is the Athens of India. The variety of buildings along the bank
is incredible. There are temples of every shape in all stages of
completion and dilapidation, and at all angles of inclination; for the
banks give way so much that many of these edifices are fearfully out of
the perpendicular.
The famed mosque, built by Aurungzebe on the site of a Hindoo temple,
is remarkable for its two octagonal minarets, 232 feet above the
Ganges. The view from it over the town, especially of the European
Resident’s quarter, is fine; but the building itself is deficient in
beauty or ornament: it commands the muddy river with its thousands of
boats, its waters peopled with swimmers and bathers, who spring in from
the many temples, water-terraces, and ghats on the city side: opposite
is a great sandy plain. The town below looks a mass of poor, square,
flat-roofed houses, of which 12,000 are brick, and 16,000 mud and
thatch, through the crowd of which, and of small temples, the eye
wanders in vain for some attractive feature or evidence of the wealth,
the devotion, the science, or the grandeur of a city celebrated
throughout the East for all these attributes. Green parrots and pigeons
people the air.
The general appearance of an oriental town is always more or less
ruinous; and here the eye is fatigued with bricks and crumbling
edifices, and the ear with prayer-bells. The bright meadows and green
trees which adorn the European Resident’s dwelling, some four miles
back from the river, alone relieve the monotony of the scene. The
streets are so narrow that it is difficult to ride a horse through
them; and the houses are often six stories high, with galleries
crossing above from house to house. These tall, gaunt edifices
sometimes give place to clumps of cottages, and a mass of dusty ruins,
the unsavoury retreats of vermin and filth, where the _Calotropis
arborea_ generally spreads its white branches and glaucous leaves—a
dusty plant. Here, too, enormous spiders’ webs hang from the crumbling
walls, choked also with dust, and resembling curtains of coarse muslin,
being often some yards across, and not arranged in radii and arcs, but
spun like weaver’s woofs. Paintings, remarkable only for their hideous
proportions and want of perspective, are daubed in vermilion, ochre,
and indigo. The elephant, camel, and porpoise of the Ganges, dog,
shepherd, peacock, and horse, are especially frequent, and so is a
running pattern of a hand spread open, with a blood-red spot on the
palm. A still less elegant but frequent object is the fuel, which is
composed of the manure collected on the roads of the city, moulded into
flat cakes, and stuck by the women on the walls to dry, retaining the
sign-manual of the artist in the impressed form of her outspread hand.
The cognizance of the Rajah, two fish chained together, appears over
the gates of public buildings.
The hundreds of temples and shrines throughout the city are its most
remarkable feature: sacred bulls, and lingams of all sizes, strewed
with flowers and grains of rice meet the eye at every turn; and the
city’s boast is the possession of one million idols, which, of one kind
and another, I can well believe. The great Hindoo festival of the
_Holi_ was now celebrating, and the city more than ordinarily crowded;
throwing red powder (lac and flour), with rose-water, is the great
diversion at a festival more childish by far than a carnival.
Through the kindness of Mr. Reade (the Commissioner), I obtained
admission to the Bishishar-Kumardil, the “holiest of holies.” It was a
small, low, stone building, daubed with red inside, and swarming with
stone images of Brahminee bulls, and various disgusting emblems. A fat
old Brahmin, naked to the waist, took me in, but allowed no followers;
and what with my ignorance of his phraseology, the clang of bells and
din of voices, I gained but little information. Some fine bells from
Nepal were evidently the lion of the temple. I emerged, adorned with a
chaplet of magnolia flowers, and with my hands full of _Calotropis_ and
_Nyctanthes_ blossoms. It was a horrid place for noise, smell, and
sights. Thence I went to a holy well, rendered sacred because Siva,
when stepping from the Himalaya to Ceylon, accidentally let a medicine
chest fall into it. The natives frequent it with little basins or
baskets of rice, sugar, etc., dropping in a little of each while they
mutter prayers.
[Illustration: Equatorial Sun-dial]
The observatory at Benares, and those at Delhi, Matra on the Jumna, and
Oujein, were built by Jey-Sing, Rajah of Jayanagar, upwards of 200
years ago; his skill in mathematical science was so well known, that
the Emperor Mahommed Shah employed him to reform the calendar. Mr.
Hunter, in the “Asiatic Researches,” gives a translation of the
lucubrations of this really enlightened man, as contained in the
introduction to his own almanac.
[Illustration: Equinoctiall Sun-dial]
Of the more important instruments I took sketches; No. 1, is the
Naree-wila, or Equatorial dial; No. 2, the Semrat-yunta, or Equinoctial
dial; No. 3, an Equatorial, probably a Kranti-urit, or Azimuth
circle.[24] Jey-Sing’s genius and love of science seem, according to
Hunter, to have descended to some of his family, who died early in this
century, when “Urania fled before the brazen-fronted Mars, and the best
of the observatories, that of Oujein, was turned into an arsenal and
cannon foundry.”
[24] Hunter, in As Soc. Researches, 177 (Calcutta); Sir R. Barker in
Phil. Trans., lxvii. 608 (1777); J. L. Williams, Phil. Trans.,
lxxxiii. 45 (1793).
[Illustration: Brass Azimuth circle]
The observatory is still the most interesting object in Benares, though
it is now dirty and ruinous, and the great stone instruments are
rapidly crumbling away. The building is square, with a central court
and flat roof, round which the astrolabes, etc. are arranged. A half
naked Astronomer-Royal, with a large sore on his stomach, took me
round—he was a pitiful object, and told me he was very hungry. The
observatory is nominally supported by the Rajah of Jeypore, who doles
out a too scanty pittance to his scientific corps.
In the afternoon Mr. Reade drove me to the Sar-nath, a singular
Boodhist temple, a cylindrical mass of brickwork, faced with stone, the
scrolls on which were very beautiful, and as sharp as if freshly cut:
it is surmounted by a tall dome, and is altogether about seventy or a
hundred feet high. Of the Boodh figures only one remains, the others
having been used by a recent magistrate of Benares in repairing a
bridge over the Goomtee! From this place the Boodhist monuments, Hindoo
temple, Mussulman mosque, and English church, were all embraced in one
_coup d’œil._ On our return, we drove past many enormous mounds of
earth and brick-work, the vestiges of Old Benares, but whether once
continued to the present city or not is unknown. Remains are abundant,
eighteen feet below the site of the present city.
Benares is the Mecca of the Hindoos, and the number of pilgrims who
visit it is incalculable. Casi (its ancient name, signifying splendid),
is alleged to be no part of this world, which rests on eternity,
whereas Benares is perched on a prong of Siva’s trident, and is hence
beyond the reach of earthquakes.[25] Originally built of gold, the sins
of the inhabitants were punished by its transmutation into stone, and
latterly into mud and thatch: whoever enters it, and especially visits
its principal idol (Siva fossilised) is secure of heaven.
[25] Probably an allusion to the infrequency of these phenomena in
this meridian; they being common both in Eastern Bengal, and in
Western India beyond the Ganges.
On the 18th I left Benares for Ghazepore, a pretty town situated on the
north bank of the river, celebrated for its manufacture of rose-water,
the tomb of Lord Cornwallis, and a site of the Company’s stud. The Rose
gardens surround the town: they are fields, with low bushes of the
plant grown in rows, red with blossoms in the morning, all of which
are, however, plucked long before midday. The petals are put into clay
stills, with twice their weight of water, and the produce exposed to
the fresh air, for a night, in open vessels. The unskimmed water
affords the best, and it is often twice and even oftener distilled; but
the fluid deteriorates by too much distillation. The Attar is skimmed
from the exposed pans, and sells at 10 pounds the rupee weight, to make
which 20,000 flowers are required. It is frequently adulterated with
sandal-wood oil.
Lord Cornwallis’ mausoleum is a handsome building, modelled by Flaxman
after the Sybil’s Temple. The allegorical designs of Hindoos and
sorrowing soldiers with reversed arms, which decorate two sides of the
enclosed tomb, though perhaps as good as can be, are under any
treatment unclassical and uncouth. The simple laurel and oak-leaf
chaplets on the alternating faces are far more suitable and suggestive.
_March 21._—I left Ghazepore and dropped down the Ganges; the general
features of which are soon described. A strong current four or five
miles broad, of muddy water, flows between a precipitous bank of
alluvium or sand on one side, and a flat shelving one of sand or more
rarely mud, on the other. Sand-banks are frequent in the river,
especially where the great affluents debouche; and there generally are
formed vast expanses of sand, small “Saharas,” studded with stalking
pillars of sand, raised seventy or eighty feet high by gusts of wind,
erect, stately, grave-looking columns, all shaft, with neither basement
nor capital, the genii of the “Arabian Nights.” The river is always
dotted with boats of all shapes, mine being perhaps of the most common
description; the great square, Yankee-like steamers, towing their
accommodation-boats (as the passengers’ floating hotels are called),
are the rarest. Trees are few on the banks, except near villages, and
there is hardly a palm to be seen above Patna. Towns are unfrequent,
such as there are being mere collections of huts, with the ghat and
boats at the bottom of the bank; and at a respectful distance from the
bazaar, stand the neat bungalows of the European residents, with their
smiling gardens, hedgings and fencings, and loitering servants at the
door. A rotting charpoy (or bedstead) on the banks is a common sight,
the “_sola reliquia_” of some poor Hindoo, who departs this life by the
side of the stream, to which his body is afterwards committed.
Shoals of small goggled-eyed fish are seen, that spring clear out of
the water; and are preyed upon by terns and other birds; a few insects
skim the surface; turtle and porpoises tumble along, all forming a very
busy contrast to the lazy alligator, sunning his green and scaly back
near the shore, with his ichthyosaurian snout raised high above the
water. Birds are numerous, especially early and late in the day. Along
the silent shore the hungry Pariah dog may be seen tearing his meal
from some stranded corpse, whilst the adjutant-bird, with his head sunk
on his body and one leg tucked up, patiently awaits his turn. At night
the beautiful Brahminee geese alight, one by one, and seek total
solitude; ever since having disturbed a god in his slumbers, these
birds are fated to pass the night in single blessedness. The gulls and
terns, again, roost in flocks, as do the wild geese and pelicans,—the
latter, however, not till after making a hearty and very noisy supper.
These birds congregate by the sides of pools, and beat the water with
violence, so as to scare the fish, which thus become an easy prey; a
fact which was, I believe, first indicated by Pallas, during his
residence on the banks of the Caspian Sea. Shells are scarce, and
consist of a few small bivalves; their comparative absence is probably
due to the paucity of limestone in the mountains whence the many
feeders flow. The sand is pure white and small-grained, with fragments
of hornblende and mica, the latter varying in abundance as a feeder is
near or far away. Pink sand[26] of garnets is very common, and
deposited in layers interstratified with the white quartz sand.
Worm-marks, ripple-marks, and the footsteps of alligators, birds and
beasts, abound in the wet sand. The vegetation of the banks consists of
annuals which find no permanent resting-place. Along the sandy shores
the ever-present plants are mostly English, as Dock, a _Nasturtium,
Ranunculus sceleratus, Fumitory, Juncus bufonius,_, Common Vervain,
_Gnaphalium luteo-album,_ and very frequently _Veronica Anagallise._ On
the alluvium grow the same, mixed with Tamarisk, _Acacia Arabica,_ and
a few other bushes.
[26] I have seen the same garnet sand covering the bottom of the
Himalayan torrents, where it is the produce of disintegrated gneiss,
and whence it is transported to the Ganges.
Withered grass abounds; and wheat, dhal (_Cajanus_) and gram (_Cicer
arietinum_), _Carthamus,_ vetches, and rice are the staple products of
the country. Bushes are few, except the universally prevalent Adhatoda
and _Calotropis._ Trees, also, are rare, and of stunted growth; Figs,
the _Artocarpus_ and some _Leguminosa_ prevail most. I saw but two
kinds of palm, the fan-palm, and _Phœnix_: the latter is characteristic
of the driest locality. Then, for the animal creation, men, women, and
children abound, both on the banks, and plying up and down the Ganges.
The humped cow (of which the ox is used for draught) is common. Camels
I occasionally observed, and more rarely the elephant; poneys, goats,
and dogs muster strong. Porpoises and alligators infest the river, even
above Benares. Flies and mosquitos are terrible pests; and so are the
odious flying-bugs,[27] which insinuate themselves between one’s skin
and clothes, diffusing a dreadful odour, which is increased by any
attempt to touch or remove them. In the evening it was impossible to
keep insects out of the boat, or to hinder their putting the lights
out; and of these the most intolerable was the abovementioned
flying-bug. Saucy crickets, too, swarm, and spring up at one’s face,
whilst mosquitos maintain a constant guerilla warfare, trying to the
patience no less than to the nerves. Thick webs of the gossamer spider
float across the river during the heat of the day, as coarse as fine
thread, and being inhaled keep tickling the nose and lips.
[27] Large Hemipterous insects, of the genus _Derecteryx._
On the 18th, the morning commenced with a dust-storm, the horizon was
about 20 yards off, and ashy white with clouds of sand; the trees were
scarcely visible, and everything in my boat was covered with a fine
coat of impalpable powder, collected from the boundless alluvial plains
through which the Ganges flows. Trees were scarcely discernible, and so
dry was the wind that drops of water vanished like magic. Neither
ferns, mosses, nor lichens grow along the banks of the Ganges, they
cannot survive the transition from parching like this to the three
months’ floods at midsummer, when the country is for miles under water.
_March 23._—Passed the mouth of the Soane, a vast expanse of sand
dotted with droves of camels; and soon after, the wide-spread spits of
sand along the north bank announced the mouth of the Gogra, one of the
vastest of the many Himalayan affluents of the Ganges.
On the 25th of March I reached Dinapore, a large military station,
sufficiently insalubrious, particularly for European troops, the
barracks being so misplaced that the inmates are suffocated: the
buildings run east and west instead of north and south, and therefore
lose all the breeze in the hottest weather. From this place I sent the
boat down to Patna, and proceeded thither by land to the house of Dr.
Irvine, an old acquaintance and botanist, from whom I received a most
kind welcome. On the road, Bengal forms of vegetation, to which I had
been for three months a stranger, reappeared; likewise groves of fan
and toddy palms, which are both very rare higher up the river; clumps
of large bamboo, orange, _Acacia Sissoo, Melia, Guatteria lonjpgolia,
Spondias manjpgera, Odina, Euphorbia pentagona, neriifolia_ and
_trigona,_ were common road-side plants. In the gardens, Papaw,
_Croton, Jatropha, Buddleia, Cookia,_ Loquat, Litchi, Longan, all kinds
of the orange tribe, and the cocoa-nut, some from their presence, and
many from their profusion, indicated a decided change of climate, a
receding from the desert north-west of India, and its dry winds, and an
approach to the damper regions of the many-mouthed Ganges.
My main object at Patna being to see the opium Godowns (stores), I
waited on Dr. Corbett, the Assistant-Agent, who kindly explained
everything to me, and to whose obliging attentions I am much indebted.
The E.I. Company grant licences for the cultivation of the poppy, and
contract for all the produce at certain rates, varying with the
quality. No opium can be grown without this licence, and an advance
equal to about two-thirds of the value of the produce is made to the
grower. This produce is made over to district collectors, who
approximately fix the worth of the contents of each jar, and forward it
to Patna, where rewards are given for the best samples, and the worst
are condemned without payment; but all is turned to some account in the
reduction of the drug to a state fit for market.
The poppy flowers in the end of January and beginning of February, and
the capsules are sliced in February and March with a little instrument
like a saw, made of three iron plates with jagged edges, tied together.
The cultivation is very carefully conducted, nor are there any very
apparent means of improving this branch of commerce and revenue. During
the N.W., or dry winds, the best opium is procured, the worst during
the moist, or E. and N.E., when the drug imbibes moisture, and a watery
bad solution of opium collects in cavities of its substance, and is
called Passewa, according to the absence of which the opium is
generally prized.
At the end of March the opium jars arrive at the stores by water and by
land, and continue accumulating for some weeks. Every jar is labelled
and stowed in a proper place, separately tested with extreme accuracy,
and valued. When the whole quantity has been received, the contents of
all the jars are thrown into great vats, occupying a very large
building, whence the mass is distributed, to be made up into balls for
the markets. This operation is carried on in a long paved room, where
every man is ticketed, and many overseers are stationed to see that the
work is properly conducted. Each workman sits on a stool, with a double
stage and a tray before him. On the top stage is a tin basin,
containing opium sufficient for three balls; in the lower another
basin, holding water: in the tray stands a brass hemispherical cup, in
which the ball is worked. To the man’s right hand is another tray, with
two compartments, one containing thin pancakes of poppy petals pressed
together, the other a cupful of sticky opium-water, made from refuse
opium. The man takes the brass cup, and places a pancake at the bottom,
smears it with opium-water, and with many plies of the pancakes makes a
coat for the opium. Of this he takes about one-third of the mass before
him, puts it inside the petals, and agglutinates many other coats over
it: the balls are then again weighed, and reduced or increased to a
certain weight if necessary. At the day’s end, each man takes his work
to a rack with numbered compartments, and deposits it in that which
answers to his own number, thence the balls (each being put in a clay
cup) are carried to an enormous drying-room, where they are exposed in
tiers, and constantly examined and turned, to prevent their being
attacked by weevils, which are very prevalent during moist winds,
little boys creeping along the racks all day long for this purpose.
When dry, the balls are packed in two layers of six each in chests,
with the stalks, dried leaves, and capsules of the plant, and sent down
to Calcutta. A little opium is prepared of very fine quality for the
Government Hospitals, and some for general sale in India; but the
proportion is trifling, and such is made up into square cakes. A good
workman will prepare from thirty to fifty balls a day, the total
produce being 10,000 to 12,000 a day; during one working season
1,353,000 balls are manufactured for the Chinese market alone.
The poppy-petal _pancakes,_ each about a foot radius, are made in the
fields by women, by the simple operation of pressing the fresh petals
together. They are brought in large baskets, and purchased at the
commencement of the season. The liquor with which the pancakes are
agglutinated together by the ball-maker, and worked into the ball, is
merely inspissated opium-water, the opium for which is derived from the
condemned opium, (Passewa,) the washing of the utensils, and of the
workmen, every one of whom is nightly laved before he leaves the
establishment, and the water is inspissated. Thus not a particle of
opium is lost. To encourage the farmers, the refuse stalks, leaves, and
heads are bought up, to pack the balls with; but this is far from an
economical plan, for it is difficult to keep the refuse from damp and
insects.
A powerful smell of opium pervaded these vast buildings, which Dr.
Corbett[28] assured me did not affect himself or the assistants. The
men work ten hours a day, becoming sleepy in the afternoon; but this is
only natural in the hot season: they are rather liable to eruptive
diseases, possibly engendered by the nature of their occupation.
[28] I am greatly indebted to Mr. Oldfield, the Opium Agent, and to
Dr. Corbett, for a complete set of specimens, implements, and
drawings, illustrating the cultivation and manufacture of Opium. They
are exhibited in the Kew Museum of Economic Botany.
Even the best East Indian opium is inferior to the Turkish, and owing
to peculiarities of climate, will probably always be so. It never
yields more than five per cent. of morphia, whence its inferiority, but
is as good in other respects, and even richer in narcotine.
The care and attention devoted to every department of collecting,
testing, manipulating, and packing, is quite extraordinary; and the
result has been an impulse to the trade, beyond what was anticipated.
The natives have been quick at apprehending and supplying the wants of
the market, and now there are more demands for licences to grow opium
than can be granted. All the opium eaten in India is given out with a
permit to licensed dealers, and the drug is so adulterated before it
reaches the retailers in the bazaars, that it does not contain
one-thirtieth part of the intoxicating power that it did when pure.
Patna is the stronghold of Mahommedanism, and from its central
position, its command of the Ganges, and its proximity to Nepal (which
latter has been aptly compared to a drawn dagger, pointed at the heart
of India), it is an important place. For this reason there are always a
European and several Native Regiments stationed there. In the
neighbourbood there is little to be seen, and the highly cultivated
flat country is unfavourable to native vegetation.
The _mudar_ plant (_Calotropis_) was abundant here, but I found that
its properties and nomenclature were far from settled points. On the
banks of the Ganges, the larger, white-flowered, sub-arboreous species
prevailed; in the interior, and along my whole previous route, the
smaller purple-flowered kind only was seen. Mr. Davis, of Rotas, was in
the habit of using the medicine copiously, and vouched for the cure of
eighty cases, chiefly of leprosy, by the _white mudar,_ gathered on the
Ganges, whilst the purple of Rotas and the neighbourhood was quite
inert: Dr. Irvine, again, used the purple only, and found the white
inert. The European and native doctors, who knew the two plants, all
gave the preference to the _white_; except Dr. Irvine, whose experience
over various parts of India is entitled to great weight.
_March 29._—Dropped down the river, experiencing a succession of east
and north-east winds during the whole remainder of the voyage. These
winds are very prevalent throughout the month of March, and they
rendered the passage in my sluggish boat sufficiently tedious. In other
respects I had but little bad weather to complain of: only one shower
of rain occurred, and but few storms of thunder and lightning. The
stream is very strong, and its action on the sand-banks conspicuous.
All night I used to hear the falling cliffs precipitated with a dull
heavy splash into the water,—a pretty spectacle in the day-time, when
the whirling current is seen to carry a cloud of white dust, like
smoke, along its course.
The Curruckpore hills, the northern boundary of the gneiss and granite
range of Paras-nath, are seen first in the distance, and then throwing
out low loosely timbered spurs towards the river; but no rock or hill
comes close to the banks till near Monghyr, where two islets of rock
rise out of the bed of the river. They are of stratified quartz,
dipping, at a high angle, to the south-east; and, as far as I could
observe, quite barren, each crowned with a little temple. The swarm of
boats from below Patna to this place was quite incredible.
_April 1._—Arrived at Monghyr, by far the prettiest town I had seen on
the river, backed by a long range of wooded hills,—detached outliers of
which rise in the very town. The banks are steep, and they appear more
so owing to the fortifications, which are extensive. A number of large,
white, two-storied houses, some very imposing, and perched on rounded
or conical hills, give a European aspect to the place.
Monghyr is celebrated for its iron manufactures, especially of muskets,
in which respect it is the Birmingham of Bengal. Generally speaking,
these weapons are poor, though stamped with the first English names. A
native workman will, however, if time and sufficient reward be given,
turn out a first rate fowling-piece. The inhabitants are reported to be
sad drunkards, and the abundance of toddy-palms was quite remarkable.
The latter, (here the _Phœnix sylvestris,_) I never saw wild, but it is
considered to be so in N.W. India; it is still a doubtful point whether
it is the same as the African species. In the morning of the following
day I went to the hot springs of Seeta-koond (wells of Seeta), a few
miles south of the town.
[Illustration: Monghyr on the Ganges, with the Curruckpore Hills in
the distance.]
The hills are hornstone and quartz, stratified and dipping southerly
with a very high angle; they are very barren, and evidently identical
with those on the south bank of the Soane; skirting, in both cases, the
granite and gneiss range of Paras-nath. The alluvium on the banks of
the Ganges is obviously an aqueous deposit subsequent to the elevation
of these hills, and is perfectly plane up to their bases. The river has
its course through the alluvium, like the Soane. The depth of the
former is in many places upwards of 100 feet, and the kunker pebbles it
contains are often disposed in parallel undulating bands. It nowhere
contains sand pebbles or fossils; concretions of lime (kunker) alone
interrupting its uniform consistence. It attains its greatest thickness
in the valleys of the Ganges and the Soane, gradually sloping up to the
Himalaya and Curruckpore hills on either flank. It is, however, well
developed on the Kymore and Paras-nath hills, 1,200 to 1 500 feet above
the Ganges valley, and I have no doubt was deposited in very deep
water, when the relative positions of these mountains to the Ganges and
Soane valleys were the same that they are now. Like every other part of
the surface of India, it has suffered much from denudation, especially
on the above-named mountains, and around their bases, where various
rocks protrude through it. Along the Ganges again, its surface is an
unbroken level between Chunar and the rocks of Monghyr. The origin of
its component mineral matter must be sought in the denudation of the
Himalayas within a very recent geological period. The contrast between
the fertility of the alluvium and the sterility of the protruded
quartzy rocks is very striking, cultivation running up to these fields
of stones, and suddenly stopping.
Unlike the Soorujkoond hot-springs, those of Seetakoond rise in a
plain, and were once covered by a handsome temple. All the water is
collected in a tank, some yards square, with steps leading down to it.
The water, which is clear and tasteless (temp. 104°), is so pure as to
be exported copiously, and the Monghyr manufactory of soda-water
presents the anomaly of owing its purity to Seeta’s ablutions.
On my passage down the river I passed the picturesque rocks of
Sultangunj; they are similar to those of Monghyr, but very much larger
and loftier. One, a round-headed mass, stands on the bank, capped with
a triple-domed Mahommedan tomb, palms, and figs. The other, which is
far more striking, rises isolated in the bed of the river, and is
crowned with a Hindoo temple, its pyramidal cone surmounted with a
curious pile of weathercocks, and two little banners. The current of
the Ganges is here very strong, and runs in deep black eddies between
the rocks.
Though now perhaps eighty or a hundred yards from the shore, the islet
must have been recently a peninsula, for it retains a portion of the
once connecting bank of alluvium, in the form of a short flat-topped
cliff, about thirty feet above the water. Some curious looking
sculptures on the rocks are said to represent Naragur (or Vishnu),
Suree and Sirooj; but to me they were quite unintelligible. The temple
is dedicated to Naragur, and inhabited by Fakirs; it is the most holy
on the Ganges.
_April 5._—I arrived at Bhagulpore, and took up my quarters with my
friend Dr. Grant, till he should arrange my dawk for Sikkim.
The town has been supposed to be the much-sought Palibothra, and a
dirty stream hard by (the Chundum), the Eranoboas; but Mr. Ravenshaw
has now brought all existing proofs to bear on Patna and the Soane. It
is, like most hilly places in India, S. of the Himalaya, the seat of
much Jain worship; and the temples on Mount Manden,[29] a few miles
off, are said to have been 540 in number. At the assumed summer-palaces
of the kings of Palibothra the ground is covered with agates, brought
from the neighbouring hills, which were, in a rough state, let into the
walls of the buildings. These agates perfectly resemble the Soane
pebbles, and they assist in the identification of these flanking hills
with those of the latter river.
[29] For the following information about Bhagulpore and its
neighbourhood, I am indebted chiefly to Col. Francklin’s essay in the
Asiatic Researches; and the late Major Napleton and Mr. Pontet.
Again, near the hills, the features of interest are very numerous. The
neighbouring mountains of Curruckpore, which are a portion of the
Rajmahal and Paras-nath range, are peopled by tribes representing the
earliest races of India, prior to the invasion of young Rama, prince of
Oude, who, according to the legend, spread Brahminism with his
conquests, and won the hand of King Jannuk’s daughter, Seeta, by
bending her father’s bow. These people are called Coles, a
middle-sized, strong, very dark, and black-haired race, with thick
lips: they have no vocation but collecting iron from the soil, which
occurs abundantly in nodules. They eat flesh, whether that of animals
killed by themselves, or of those which have died a natural death, and
mix with Hindoos, but not with Mussulmen. There are other tribes,
vestiges of the Tamulian race, differing somewhat in their rites from
these, and approaching, in their habits, more to Hindoos; but all are
timorous and retiring.
The hill-rangers, or Bhagulpore-rangers, are all natives of the
Rajmahal hills, and form a local corps maintained by the Company for
the protection of the district. For many years these people were
engaged in predatory excursions, which, owing to the nature of the
country, were checked with great difficulty. The plan was therefore
conceived, by an active magistrate in the district, of embodying a
portion into a military force, for the protection of the country from
invasions of their own tribes; and this scheme has answered perfectly.
To me the most interesting object in Bhagulpore was the Horticultural
Gardens, whose origin and flourishing condition are due to the activity
and enterprise of the late Major Napleton, commander of the
hill-rangers. The site is good, consisting of fifteen acres, that were,
four years ago, an indigo field, but form now a smiling garden. About
fifty men are employed; and the number of seeds and vegetables annually
distributed is very great. Of trees the most conspicuous are the
tamarind, _Tecoma jasminoides, Erythrina, Adansonia, Bombax,_ teak,
banyan, peepul, _Sissoo, Casuarina, Terminalia, Melia, Bauhinia._ Of
introduced species English and Chinese flat peaches (pruned to the
centre to let the sun in), Mangos of various sorts, _Eugenia Jambos,_
various Anonas, Litchi, Loquat and Longan, oranges, _Sapodilla_; apple,
pear, both succeeding tolerably; various Cabool and Persian varieties
of fruit-trees; figs, grapes, guava, apricots, and jujube. The grapes
looked extremely well, but they require great skill and care in the
management. They form a long covered walk, with a row of plantains on
the W. side, to diminish the effects of the hot winds, but even with
this screen, the fruit on that side are inferior to that on the
opposite trellis. Easterly winds, again, being moist, blight these and
other plants, by favouring the abundant increase of insects, and
causing the leaves to curl and fall off; and against this evil there is
no remedy. With a clear sky the mischief is not great; under a cloudy
one the prevalence of such winds is fatal to the crop. The white ant
sometimes attacks the stems, and is best checked by washing the roots
with limewater, yellow arsenic, or tobacco-water. Numerous Cerealia,
and the varieties of cotton, sugar-cane, etc. all thrive extremely
well; so do many of our English vegetables. Cabbages, peas, and beans
are much injured by the caterpillars of a _Pontia,_ like our English
“White;” raspberries, currants, and gooseberries will not grow at all.
The seeds were all deposited in bottles, and hung round the walls of a
large airy apartment; and for cleanliness and excellence of kind they
would bear comparison with the best seedsman’s collection in London. Of
English garden vegetables, and varieties of the Indian Cerealia, and
leguminous plants, Indian corn, millets, rice, etc., the collections
for distribution were extensive.
The manufacture of economic products is not neglected. Excellent coffee
is grown; and arrow-root, equal to the best West Indian, is prepared,
at 18_s._ 6_d._ per bottle of twenty-four ounces, about a fourth of the
price of that article in Calcutta.
In most respects the establishment is a model of what such institutions
ought to be in India; not only of real practical value, in affording a
good and cheap supply of the best culinary and other vegetables that
the climate can produce, but as showing to what departments efforts are
best directed. Such gardens diffuse a taste for the most healthy
employments, and offer an elegant resource for the many unoccupied
hours which the Englishman in India finds upon his hands. They are also
schools of gardening; and a simple inspection of what has been done at
Bhagulpore is a valuable lesson to any person about to establish a
private garden of his own.
I often heard complaints made of the seeds distributed from these
gardens not vegetating freely in other parts of India, and it is not to
be expected that they should retain their vitality unimpaired through
an Indian rainy season; but on the other hand I almost invariably found
that the planting and tending had been left to the uncontrolled
management of native gardeners, who with a certain amount of skill in
handicraft are, from habits and prejudices, singularly unfit for the
superintendence of a garden.